Hardbody to Close BUT- Page 2

[dramamama611]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 6:00am

A life in rep, sure....but it's not going to be huge. Schools and communities won't touch it because with its small cast, they won't attract an audience.


This wasn't high on my list of what to see, but assumed I'd get to it this summer. [Sigh]

[jayinchelsea]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 7:36am

I haven't seen it, and now won't be able to, but the sad thing is that it has a great chance of getting at least a few Tony nominations, probably for Best Musical (it's a pretty weak season), and it won't be around to try to turn that into box office.

[Stage Door Sally]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 8:29am

Reeve Carney, Bono, and The Edge recorded Rise Above from Spider-Man, it was released digitally. They performed it on TV together too.

[newintown]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 9:09am

A colorless show with one-dimensional characters, a cardboard book, generic music, and ignore-able lyrics?

Yes, I bet it will become the next Oklahoma everywhere west of the Hudson, where people really know how to appreciate bad theatre.

Posted: 4/10/13 at 9:57am

Hardbody to Close BUT

I think it's a good decision but feel the need to point out that when it refers to a body part it's spelled b-u-t-t.

[g.d.e.l.g.i.]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 10:14am

The closest I could find was a story on March 21st (the day the show opened) where Trey Anastasio said that the next day (after the opening) he was going to begin work on the next Phish album.

That's easy when it's already written and audience-tested, both by the band and on Broadway. Thanks for the input, darquegk. Namo... let's see... gotta be inventive with this one, I've already used a lot of politeness drenched in invective... AH! A Sondheim quote! "How I've lived without you all these years, I'll never know!"

[eperkins]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 12:03pm

I liked this show, but I don't see a big life for it in regional theatre because of the truck. On Broadway, they aren't using a real truck - it's very definitely a custom job. It moves around the stage easily, rotates, and can be danced on (including the bed cover and the windshield). I wouldn't try that with a real truck. And if you DID use a real truck, it would pretty much have to sit there the whole time, making what is a very static show to begin with even more static.

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 12:47pm

I have a feeling this will actually be quite popular in the regional/amateur circuit. The set and staging could be conceptualized in a variety of ways. I think the audience can accept the idea that they have their hands on a truck without having an actual truck or an expensive specialized custom prop on stage.

[eperkins]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 12:55pm

Well, it might be interesting to see what people come up with to solve the truck problem (among other things).

Posted: 4/10/13 at 12:56pm

Are you kidding? Build a truck. Get Conlon & Collins Ford to loan you a truck and put their ad in the program. (Hey, that would make a good local newspaper story!) Have a virtual truck. Have a PICTURE of a truck. Go buy a junked non-running truck, paint it and have the whole cast PUSH it into the theater (wait, that's ANOTHER good newspaper story!). Use a 4 ft high platform that says TRUCK on the side.

You can rent a plant that eats people, you don't think Tams Witmark is going to have resources for companies that want to produce this???

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 12:59pm

IT CAN'T BE DONE, JOE. IT CAN'T BE DONE

[AEA AGMA SM]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 1:01pm

Tams? Going by shows of theirs that I have worked on in the past you'll be lucky to get a script that doesn't look like it will fall apart if you look at it wrong.

Now, if MTI or R&H pick up the licensing rights for this show I would agree with you. I've done lots of shows with actual cars onstage. It's really not as difficult as people seem to think it is.

[eperkins]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 1:10pm

I don't think it's difficult to put a car - or truck in this case - on stage. My point is the show is very static - and more like a play than a musical. The truck was a big old prop for a reason; they were trying to get more "life" and action into the staging. Dancing around a parked truck ain't gonna be a lot of fun. Sort of like watching paint dry.

Maybe they could have the truck offstage and have all the songs occur during the contestant breaks. Problem solved.

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 1:13pm

I don't see what the issue is. They had a car onstage in GYPSY that she drove the kids around the country in.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 1:14pm

I think eperkins is right. If he can't solve the issue for regional productions, no one can.

[eperkins]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 1:26pm

Ha ha. I didn't say it couldn't be done. I was answering the statement that some people think it would have a big life in regional theatre. I happen to think there a lot of reasons why it probably won't have such a life. Maybe a National Tour could do well. Time alone will tell.

Posted: 4/10/13 at 1:29pm

People do Floyd Collins. People dancing around a truck is 42nd St. by comparison.

[eperkins]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 1:47pm

I'll be happy to be proven wrong. Like I said, I'm one of the ones who actually enjoyed the show.

[adam.peterson44]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 4:00pm

Did the Lincoln Centre film this production for its Theatre On Film and Tape archives?

[logan2]

Posted: 4/10/13 at 5:37pm

FindindNamo said: "He won't. And they won't. For exactly the same reasons. It would be like Gene SImmons playing bass on one of Paul Stanley's paintings."

That's hilarious. And I am now officially in love with FindingNamo for making a KISS reference.

[Caring Soul]

Posted: 4/11/13 at 1:51am

Why did they choose such a horrible title for the play? It sounds like a cheap porn flick from the 80's. For that reason alone, it won't do much business in the high school circuit.

[ClydeBarrow]

Posted: 4/11/13 at 8:26am

Why did they choose such a horrible title for the play?

Um because that's what the documentary and the original contest was called...

[bdn223]

Posted: 4/11/13 at 9:13am

@eperkins They are using a real truck on stage, it is just mounted on casters so that the cast can move the truck more easily than putting the truck in neutral. When I saw the show I was sitting next to a car salesman, who pointed the casters out to me. He also stated that most dealerships when moving cars into the showroom mount them onto casters since it is to dangerous to drive them in to the showroom and to difficult to push them into place while they are in neutral. The only other modification to the truck was that there is a block placed in the trunk with handles for the cast to hold while moving the truck, which is meant to look like a cover.

[newintown]

Posted: 4/11/13 at 9:14am

And god forbid a musical version of an existing source create a new title...

[ClydeBarrow]

Posted: 4/11/13 at 9:20am

And how often does that happen? It negates the fact that you're adapting an existing property that has title recognition. Just because most people hadn't heard of the documentary before doesn't mean no one has.